Wednesday, August 27, 2014

Several times this week, someone mentioned to me that this has been an unusual summer. When I asked what was unusual, the other person mentioned "cool weather."

Without checking the statistics, I agreed. I remember a large number of mornings since mid-July when temperatures were in the lower 60s -- and, in a few cases, even the upper 50s. The low temperature Wednesday morning at Charlotte Douglas International Airport was 57, just 2 degrees off the record for the date.

Temperatures are a few degrees below average in August and were a bit below average in July.

But the numbers tell a different story. I defined "cool mornings" as days when the low was less than 65 degrees. In mid-summer, Charlotte's average daily low is almost 70 degrees.

By that measure, August 2014 has been pretty much the same as the last three years. July 2014 was definitely cooler, though.

Here's a look at the numbers in Charlotte, through Wednesday:

AUGUSTCooler than 65 degrees in 2014: 5 days (4 more had a low of 65).

2013: 6 days (2 more were 65)

2012: 9 days (3 more were 65)

2011: 7 days (3 more were 65)

2010: 2 days

JULY2014: 6 days (2 more were 65)

2013: 0

2012: 0

2011: 2 days (1 more was 65)

2010: 4 days, including 2 in the 50s (1 more was 65)

Weather records show that Charlotte usually gets a stretch of several days in August, usually near the end of the month, when cooler temperatures seep southward and lows are in the low 60s. That doesn't usually happen in July, however.

All things considered, this has been an ordinary summer in the Carolinas, with a stretch of wet and rather unpleasant weekends in late July and early August.

Saturday, August 23, 2014

A tropical depression developed Saturday evening in the southeast Bahamas, and the National Hurricane Center expects the system to become a tropical storm on Sunday and a Category 1 hurricane by late Tuesday or Wednesday.

It will be the third named storm of the Atlantic season, Cristobal.

Now comes the fun part ... figuring out what impact, if any, Cristobal will have on the Southeast coast, and the Carolinas in particular.

The official National Hurricane Center forecast map calls for Cristobal to remain a few hundred miles off the coast, sort of splitting the difference between Arthur, which made landfall on the North Carolina coast July 3, and Bertha, which passed about halfway between the United States and Bermuda.

Cristobal's sustained winds are forecast to be 80 mph by Thursday.

If you look at the computer models, they mostly forecast Cristobal to move northerly from the Bahamas and remain off the Florida coast, then curve a bit northeast and miss the Carolinas comfortably.

But if you remember correctly, the official forecast for Arthur also called for a miss. That didn't happen.

It appears as if a trough over the Northeast would grab Cristobal and steer it away from the mainland, but there is enough uncertainty over what will happen later this week to make National Hurricane Center meteorologists a bit nervous.

As forecaster Michael Brennan said Saturday evening, it's a low-confidence forecast right now.

Thursday, August 21, 2014

Strong high pressure is building over the lower Mississippi Valley, and it's pumping the hottest air of the summer into the Carolinas on Thursday and Friday, but the Charlotte region won't have to endure the heat as long as our neighbors to the west.

Slightly cooler weather is likely Saturday, and a pronounced cooldown will arrive Sunday and last through the middle of next week.

That's because another high pressure system is forecast to build this weekend in the New England area. If that sounds familiar, it's because New England highs have been the dominant pattern in the eastern United States since mid-July.

The New England high will push its influence down the East Coast, driving a "back-door" cold front southward across the Carolinas on Saturday night. Behind that front, we'll be in a cooler air mass that also will be stable enough to prevent thunderstorm activity.

That cold front won't push much farther west than the eastern part of Georgia, so much of the South -- except the Carolinas and Virginia -- will continue to deal with temperatures in the mid and upper 90s into early next week.

For us, it'll be low to mid 80s for highs from Sunday through next Wednesday.

Before that, it will be hot. Temperatures climbed into the mid 90s Thursday afternoon across the area, and National Weather Service meteorologist Harry Gerapetritis said we could add a degree or two Friday. "Southern Piedmont heat index values could surpass 100 degrees Friday afternoon," Gerapetritis said, referring to the combined impact of temperature and humidity.

By Saturday, that New England high will be pushing its influence into Virginia. That, in turn, will push the track of thunderstorms from Kentucky-West Virginia-Virginia-Maryland farther south, into the Carolinas. We could see another 90-degree day Saturday, but there'll be more clouds and higher thunderstorm chances than Thursday and Friday.

The cooler weather will be apparent Sunday, with more clouds than sun and highs around 82 degrees in Charlotte.

Those cooler conditions will arrive just in time for the first day of school for most of North Carolina's public school students.

And in the tropics ... The National Hurricane Center is following an area of disturbed weather east of the Lesser Antilles. That area could become a tropical depression by Friday, and it's forecast to curve northwest. That track will take the system near Hispaniola and Puerto Rico, and that means the mountains of those two islands could suppress the storm's development.

Once it clears those islands, it's expected to strengthen again over the Bahamas by late in the weekend or early next week.

I've seen talk about a possible impact on the U.S. Gulf or Southeast coasts, but that's extremely premature. The system could disintegrate over the Dominican Republic and Haiti, or it could recurve away from the U.S. coast. It's far too early to worry about anything threatening the U.S. mainland.

Otherwise, it's quiet in the tropics as we move into what is typically the busiest time of the year for hurricanes. But that's what forecasters expected this year -- a quieter season.

Monday, August 18, 2014

A strong high pressure system would build over the Carolinas, and we'd experience a week of hot weather -- perhaps our hottest week of the summer.

The heat would extend through the week and possibly into the early part of next week, with only a few chances of thunderstorms. The greatest chance of storms would come Monday afternoon and evening.

Scratch that idea.

As it turns out, Monday's thunderstorms affected the mountains during the morning, then split apart and developed in the afternoon over the South Carolina Midlands and up in Virginia. The Charlotte region could escape without a drop of rain.

And as for the rest of the week?

Well, it figures to be warm, but not at the kind of levels -- mid and upper 90s -- that we first expected. Instead, it appears as if the Carolinas might wind up being right along the path of several clusters of showers and thunderstorms being shunted from the Great Lakes southeastward.

High pressure that has dominated the western United States has shifted a bit to the east, and the computer models indicate that the Carolinas will be on the eastern edge of the high. Often, clusters of storms -- known to meteorologists as mesoscale convective system (MCS) -- form on the edge of the high pressure systems and are steered around that edge. It appears as if the Carolinas could be on that edge.

That means these clusters of storms could move into the Carolinas at times during the week. For meteorologists, that's a headache. It makes forecasts of more than 36 or 48 hours a bit risky, and that could be the case this week.

And later in the week, there are growing signs that another cold air wedge could push into the Carolinas. Those wedges, formed when cool and moist air is pumped from the Atlantic Ocean into the Piedmont by high pressure systems over the Northeast, have made frequent appearances this summer in our region.

If that happens, forget about the 90s this weekend. We could be looking at thick overcast and temperatures in the mid and upper 70s.

Thursday, August 14, 2014

I hope you haven't caught yourself thinking that maybe we're done with the heat this summer.

The computer models are pointing toward a warmup over the next few days, and that could be followed by some even warmer temperatures by the end of next week and into the start of the kids' school year Aug. 25.

We're not talking about 100-degree weather, but temperatures in the mid 90s will feel hot, after the kind of weather we've experienced since mid-July.

Carolinas' temperatures -- and, in fact, readings across the eastern two-thirds of the country -- have been well below average for the last four or five weeks. In Charlotte, we're nearly 3 degrees below the monthly average temperature so far.

It's been wet, too. While the rainfall numbers at Charlotte Douglas International Airport haven't been noteworthy, there have been several heavy rain events across the region recently. Beachgoers know what I mean. Rain has fallen three straight weekends on the Carolinas coast.

I spent last week at Sunset Beach, and rain fell all seven days I was there.

It only makes sense that things will change, and now that seems to be taking place. Our pattern for the past month has been wet and cool, but the computers are hinting at a change -- warm, with only scattered daily thunderstorm activity.

The Global model was producing forecasts this week that point to 100-degree weather in the Carolinas around the Aug. 23-26 period, but with all the rainfall we've had since mid-July, it doesn't seem likely that we'll get that hot. Some of the heat will be expended drying out the ground, so we'd probably see mid 90s instead.

We'll also be watching the Atlantic, because the tropics have been quiet so far this season.

That was the prediction, with an intensifying El Nino in the Pacific basin expected to limit the development of tropical storms and hurricanes in the Atlantic and Caribbean. But we've had only two named storms so far this season, and that's the smallest number at mid-August since 2009.

Once again, it makes sense to expect some development in the Atlantic next week.

And what about autumn? The government's Climate Prediction Center seems to be pointing toward a warm autumn for the Carolinas.

The forecast for August through October calls for average temperatures, but the September-November and October-December forecasts show a strong chance of above-average temperatures -- and above-average precipitation.

In other words, expect warm and wet weather for September, October and November.

And that ties in with a couple of autumn forecasts I've seen in recent days.

About this blog

Steve Lyttle says growing up in northeastern Ohio, with its foot-deep snows and summertime severe thunderstorms, fueled his interest in meteorology. He has written about weather for 10 years at The Observer. Join the discussion about weather trends and weird weather events -- whether local or around the world.